


The Mouths of Babes

by ImpishTubist



Series: Living Witness [3]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-08
Updated: 2014-07-08
Packaged: 2018-02-08 00:24:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,193
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1919748
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ImpishTubist/pseuds/ImpishTubist
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Alice scrubbed a hand across her eye and bowed her head, looking suddenly sullen. “You’re not my daddy.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Mouths of Babes

**Author's Note:**

> It's very likely this won't make sense if you haven't read the first two stories. All my thanks to Kim for her encouragement (and bad influence).

Two o’clock was an unfamiliar hour of the night in this house.

 

Sherlock was used to two o’clock at Baker Street. He knew which pipes would creak and pop, and which floorboard was likely to squeak and wake Mary if he got up in the middle of the night. He could tell precisely how late at night it was by the stillness in 221b, and he could navigate the flat flawlessly in the dark.

 

But in the early weeks of summer, he and Mary had packed up the flat that had quickly become too small for their family and moved to this quiet row house. Their new home had room enough for Sherlock’s experiments so that he wouldn’t need to keep them in the kitchen any longer, and Alice had a bedroom that was twice the size of her old one. There was even a yard, and Mary had mentioned that they might want to look into getting a dog.

 

And, at the height of summer, a new occupant came to live in the bedroom next to Alice’s.

 

Henry had been born in sticky mid-July - three months ago now, though it felt as though it had only been a few weeks. Lestrade said that Henry looked unmistakably like Sherlock, though Sherlock insisted that the baby took after his mother more. The only thing Sherlock and Henry had in common that he could see was dark hair, and a penchant for keeping odd hours at night.

 

He hadn’t gone to bed yet this night, so when Henry started to fuss at two, Sherlock saw to him almost immediately. It was a soiled nappy that was the offender this time, so Sherlock changed the squirming infant and then took him downstairs to the living room, where he settled on the sofa and cradled Henry in the crook of his arm.

 

“Hush,” Sherlock said, gently bouncing Henry in his arms. “You’re going to wake your mother.”

 

Henry eventually stopped his fussing, though he showed no signs of wanting to return to sleep again. He stared up at Sherlock in seeming fascination, and several times made a grab for his nose. Sherlock leaned down, allowing Henry to try to wrap his tiny hand around the tip of his nose, and scrunched up his face to make Henry giggle.

 

Eventually, Henry drifted off. Sherlock continued to hold him, knowing that moments like this were fleeting. They had passed all too quickly with Alice.

 

“Daddy?”

 

Sherlock looked up to see Alice standing in the doorway. She had her favorite blanket clutched in one hand, and it dragged behind her on the floor.

 

“Did the baby wake you up?” Sherlock patted the cushion next to him, and Alice came over and pulled herself up on the sofa.

 

“Yeah.” Alice peered at Henry for a moment. “Why does he cry so much?”

 

“Because he can’t take care of himself, and he needs us to do it for him.”

 

“Oh.” Alice frowned. “Daddy, when’s he going back?”

 

“Back?” Sherlock looked at her. “Back where?”

 

“Back to the hospital.” Alice hugged her blanket tight to her chest. “I don’t want him here anymore.”

 

“We’re not taking him back, Alice,” Sherlock said, trying not to sound as surprised as he felt. He had thought she had understood the mechanics of Mary’s pregnancy. He knew he had been very careful to dispel all myths she might have picked up at school about where babies came from. They were certainly not commodities one picked up at a hospital on a whim. “He’s your brother. He’s going to stay.”

 

“Forever?”

 

Well, for eighteen years or so, but that was probably the same thing in her mind. “Yes. Forever.”

 

“Oh.” Alice buried her face in Sherlock’s side, and he wrapped his free arm around her. She wasn’t crying, not that he could tell, but Alice rarely did cry. She showed her distress in other ways.

 

“What’s wrong?” he asked softly.

 

“I don’t like him,” Alice declared, her voice muffled against Sherlock’s shirt. “Want it to be just you and me and Mama again.”

 

“Why?”

 

“Because you love him more than me!” She lifted her head and glared at him accusingly. “You’re his real daddy, and not mine!”

 

Alice scrubbed a hand across her eye and bowed her head, looking suddenly sullen. She repeated, quietly, “You’re not my daddy.”

 

Well, this was a new problem. As far as Sherlock was aware, Alice had no recollection of John Watson, and he and Mary had both decided that it was a subject better broached when she was older and could understand the nuances of the situation.

 

“Ally,” he said gently, “where did you hear that?”

 

“Mrs Asher,” Alice said sadly. So her primary school teacher was to blame. “We were talkin’ about ‘doption, and she said that’s what I was.”

 

“Alice, you have lived with me since you were a baby,” Sherlock said quietly. “You are my real daughter, just like Henry is my real son. There is no difference between you two.”

 

Alice sniffed. “But Mrs Asher is right?”

 

Sherlock hesitated. “Yes, in a way.”

 

“So where’s my - my other daddy?”

 

Sherlock winced inwardly.

 

“He’s - gone,” he decided on finally. “And he’s not coming back.”

 

“Oh.” Alice absorbed this for a moment. “Is that why you married Mama?”

 

“Well -” How could he even begin to parse _that_ situation for a five-year-old? “No. I married her because we love each other.”

 

“Did my other daddy like me?”

 

Oh, good Lord. “Yes, of course he did.”

 

“Did he like Mama?”

 

Shit. “Er - yes, he did. He loved her.”

 

Sherlock bit his lip and held his breath, hoping Alice would accept the words without further questions. He hadn’t told such blatant lies since his years pretending to be dead.

 

“So why did he go away?”

 

That one Sherlock could at least answer truthfully. “I don’t know, Ally.”

 

“Do you love me like he did?”

 

John had never bonded with his daughter as a baby, had done everything he could to convince himself that she wasn’t his, and Sherlock would be damned if Alice ever found that out. He couldn’t allow her to be hurt like that, and by a dead man no less.

 

“I love you just as much as I love Henry,” he said instead, hoping that would be satisfactory for her. It meant more, anyway. “You are both my children, and I love you both very much. Okay?”

 

Alice considered this for a moment, her brow furrowing as she thought about it.

 

“Okay,” she decided finally. “But no more babies.”

 

Sherlock laughed. _That_ was a conversation for another time - his preference for men, his willingness to meet Mary’s needs to the best of his ability anyway, the desperate night that had led to Henry’s conception…

 

On second thought, some things were best left unsaid.

 

“No more babies,” Sherlock said. “Don’t worry. Mama and I agree with you.”

 

“Good,” Alice said. She slid off the couch and disappeared back upstairs.

 

Sherlock made a mental note to have a word with Mycroft tomorrow about older siblings, and whether Mycroft had ever wanted to return _him_ to the hospital when he was a baby.

 


End file.
